Since the New Deal, Republicans have been on the wrong side of every issue of concern
to ordinary Americans; Social Security, the war in Vietnam, equal rights,
civil liberties, church- state separation, consumer issues, public education, reproductive
freedom, national health care, labor issues, gun policy, campaign-finance
reform, the environment
and tax fairness. No political party could
remain so consistently wrong by accident.
The only rational conclusion is
that, despite their cynical "family values" propaganda, the Republican Party
is a criminal conspiracy to betray the interests of the American people
in
favor of plutocratic and corporate interests, and absolutist religious groups.

DeLay, whose indictment in Texas forced him to "officially" relinquish his leader- ship post. After all, only Blunt
comes close to DeLay for brazenness when it comes to ignoring federal election
laws and House ethics rules. Taking "consti-
tuent service" to new extremes, Blunt unsuccessfully attempted to insert lang-
uage into legislation favorable
to Phillip Morris/Atria and UPS after huge contri-
butions funneled through
his lobbyist
son and wife (surely just a coincidence). Blunt's
PAC also paid $88,000 to DeLay's Texas co-conspirator Jim Ellis for "consulting fees," and Blunt himself
is the largest contributor to DeLay's
defense fund ($20,000). But will Blunt give up the Majority Leadership when Delay's conviction is overturned by partisan Republican judges? MORE

Fitzgerald closing in, Dubya drinking again, DeLay indicted, Frist under investigation
by the SEC -- thanks be to
the dark gods that I got my blanket pardon
signed in 2001.

The Bush administration's lack
of an effective response to the
disasters along the Gulf Coast should come as no surprise at
this late date.
After five years of undivided Republican rule in the United States, only the
most uninformed and credulous can actually still believe that Republi-
can
leaders consider government's prime responsibility to be the welfare of American citizens.

To those that have been wiped out by the one-two punch of hurricanes
Katrina and Rita: sorry folks, your misery and despair isn't even worthy of consideration
by our august Republican leaders -- except when they are forced to
utter empty words of consolation and deceptive promises of immi-
nent aid
when the television cameras are rolling.

Of course, they're lying.
They know they're lying. And they don't care. They don't care about the suffering
of the thousands of newly dis-
placed, homeless and unemployed Americans.
There's a psychological term for those who can lie without hesitation and have
no empathy for the pain and suffering of others: sociopathy (or anti-social person-
ality disorder). The Republican Party -- and through
them our country -- has been hijacked by sociopaths.

If there's any
doubt about that fact, just look at the GOP's first political responses to the
catastrophe: voiding the long-established Davis- Bacon "prevailing-wage" law, which would have guaranteed that workers in the stricken areas would be paid at
least $9 per hour on Halliburton's sweetheart no-bid reconstruction contracts;
and the gutting of envi-
ronmental regulations allowing more pollution from refineries. These were the Bush adminis-
tration's first priorities. Permanent
shelter, medical care, jobs and education -- the stuff that will actually
help people? Those will have to wait for commissions and task-force recommendations
until sometime after the mid-term elections (i.e., never).

If
our government exists to "promote the general welfare," an administration
that has engaged in an unnecessary war, and whose policies increase poverty, decrease health-care availability and allow increased pollution levels can be described
as sociopathic -- and these have been the indisputable, quantifiable results
of the policies
of the Bush administration and the Republican Party.

Psychologists
and historians will argue for years about the real
reason Mr. Bush had for his war in Iraq (Oil? Imperial conquest? Dom-
estic
politics? Oedipal rivalry?). The only undeniable truth that we have about Iraq at this point is that our invasion and occupation,
the tens of thousands of needless deaths and the policy of torture for those merely
suspected of terrorist affi-
liation, were not due to the reasons we were originally
told. The socio-
paths in the Bush administration knowingly and skillfully
lied to get us into that bloody quagmire.

Consider the depths of sociopathy
that is required for a "leader" to eagerly shift the levers of history
to maneuver our country into an un-
necessary war, with all the unnec-
essary
deaths and maiming of our brave young soldiers as well as of innocent
civilians. Only a truly conscienceless sociopath could perpetrate a crime of such
magnitude.

If it were only George W. Bush's sociopathy at issue,
our country could deal with it through estab-
lished constitutional
mechanisms. Unfortunately, the political socio-
pathy runs much deeper --
infecting the entire leadership and a broad majority of the GOP. Does any-
body
on either end of the political spectrum seriously believe that Vice
President Cheney possesses anything approximating human empathy or conscience?

For
evidence of the sociopathic cancer eating away at the Repub-
lican
Party, one need look no further than the architect of today's corrosive,
utterly polarized political climate: former House Speaker Newt Gingrich. It
may seem like ancient history now, but it was Gingrich who first began the rhetorical
"total war" we see today. Political opponents (Democrats) weren't to be described as "mistaken"
on issues, but rather "sick," "pathetic," "treasonous," and so on. This
strategy sprang forth from the mind of a man so lacking in empathy and conscience
that he served his wife divorce papers as she lay recovering from cancer
surgery in a hospital bed.

That tradition of sociopathic Republican
leadership continues today with House Majority Leader Tom DeLay (R-TX). Known
as the "Hammer," DeLay rules the US House of Representatives as a personal fiefdom
(it was DeLay that installed the pliable Dennis Hastert as the putative Speaker).
How did DeLay achieve this unprecedented control over half the Congress?
In a word, cash. His fundraising machine amounts to an extortion racket
that would put the mafia to shame. Corporate lobbyists can draft their own legislation
for tax cuts, direct federal subsidies, relaxing pollution and worker-safety
regulations, etc., and see them enacted into law -- and all they have to
do is make generous donations to DeLay's PACs.

DeLay is so flush with cash that
he will finance primary
challenges to any Republican congressman daring to resist his dictatorial con-
trol.
Conversely, he rewards com-
pliant Republicans with generous
campaign donations. As can be seen by the rigid "party discipline" DeLay imposes
in the House, only very popular incumbent Repub-
licans from the safest
possible districts can dare to resist his diktats.

Visit the Hall of Shame Archives

Exposing the ugly truth
about the Republican Party's diabolical plot to replace
constitutional democracy with an oligarchic
fascist theocracy...

It's the only rational explanation!

Why does the Republican Party zealously pursue policies so obviously counter to the
best interests of ordinary Americans?

Bush, DeLay & the GOP Sociopathocracy Continued
Bush has no better ally in the Congress than DeLay. The president's policies
can be dependably jammed through the House with no fear of meddlesome oversight,
and DeLay need not fear any investigations from the Justice Depart-
ment
for his corrupt fundraising schemes.

The point here is that for Bush,
DeLay and a controlling
majority of Republicans, the function of government
is not about improving the quality of life for Americans, but power
--
power for its own sake. Based on the last five years of undivided, unchallenged
Republican governance, that power has been used to do harm to the interests
of the vast majority of Americans in order to serve the interests of a very
few. Can that be described as anything other than sociopathic?

The
Republicans' apologists would argue that they do indeed serve a large, powerless
constituency: unplanned fetuses. The GOP's demagoguery on abortion has
given them a huge electoral payoff among the religious right with the expenditure
of virtually no political capital. However, Republican devotion to the interests
of children can't be considered more than shameless pandering since their
concern for child welfare ends at the moment of birth.

As we at evilGOPbastards
have opined before, the Repub-
lican Party has been a repository
for America's sociopaths since the New Deal -- pandering to and harboring an
assortment of racists, fascists, religious absolutists and "drown-the-beast"
anti-tax radicals. While the racists now know better than to espouse their noxious
beliefs in polite company (William Bennett notwithstanding), the other radical tenets of the sociopathic right are now considered
mainstream Republican ideology.

The long-term effects of sociopathic governance (war, deficits, the environment, poverty and unemployment, etc.) would normally
be expected to take its toll on Republican power -- if American democracy still
functioned. After the suspicious 2004 presidential election results, this assum-
ption
cannot be taken for granted.

This is waaaaay beyond normal
political hardball, but one wouldn't be able to recognize that by the timid
response by the Democrats, who seem paralyzed by the brazenness of GOP corruption
and blind to the enormity of the danger to our democracy.

Are
there still enough Republicans, not just of integrity and honor but of sanity, willing to challenge the sociopaths for control of the party of Lincoln in order
to save our nation from self-inflicted ruin?

Sadly, apparently not.

"The central vision of DeLayism is of a political system whereby business gains almost
total control over the Republican agenda, and in return the GOP gains unlimited
financial influence over the electoral process.

Since many of
the formal and informal rules of American politics are designed to prevent this
sort of corrupt plutocracy from coming to fruition, scandal follows DeLayism
like night follows day." - Jonathan Chait.